Community builder

In 1991, Dave Keenan travelled to Eastern Europe as part of a Greater Toronto Home Builders’ Association delegation seeking to establish trade relations with a part of the world that was just emerging from decades of socialist rule.

For Keenan, Pacific region vice-president for Genstar Development Company, witnessing how people lived in Hungary and the former Yugoslavia and Czechoslovakia was a poignant, eye-opening experience.

“I saw hundreds and hundreds of people cramped into 400 sq. ft. apartments in 12-storey buildings with no elevator,” says Keenan, who recalls being followed by KGB agents everywhere they went in Prague.

“I was with Hungarians who had fled to Canada (decades earlier) and were going back for the first time, and they saw the destruction of community and family values after the country was taken over by socialists.”

This impacted him deeply. The trip not only made Keenan appreciate what he had back in Canada, it also served to reinforce the values that have shaped his approach over a 30-year career.

“Fundamentally, my goal in life is to create communities that people of all income levels and age groups can live together in,” he says. “Something they can take pride in.”

Keenan was born in 1947 in Oshawa, Ont., Canada’s motor city. His grandfather, George Keenan, was a master craftsman for the McLaughlin-Buick Company — the precursor to General Motors of Canada Ltd. — and built plywood Mosquito bombers during the Second World War.

Growing up, Keenan was active in the local sports scene, playing lacrosse and hockey with the likes of Bobby Orr and his cousin, NHL coach Mike Keenan (but don’t hold that against him.)

In 1968, he left to attend University of Waterloo, where he met his future wife, Susan. (The two married in 1971 and have three sons together.) Graduating Waterloo with an honours degree in environmental studies, Keenan went on to earn an MBA from York University in Toronto in 1981.

Keenan began his career working for the City of Oshawa in its planning department, and in subsequent years held planning positions in communities across Greater Toronto. In 1978 he joined Toronto-based Clayton Research Associates Ltd. as an economist, focusing on housing market studies and municipal finance.

Soon after, Keenan was hired by one of Clayton’s clients, UK-based construction firm Costain Ltd.

Costain eventually was bought out and became Coscan Development Corp., for whom Keenan worked until 1992. (Coscan was renamed Brookfield Homes Ltd.three years later).

Keenan transferred to Brookfield’s sister company, Toronto-based Bramalea Ltd., where he served as senior vice-president, before moving to Intrawest ULC to help the development giant establish a Toronto office.

Intrawest spun off its residential development arm, which became Intracorp. Keenan ran the firm’s Toronto operations for two years as executive vice-president. He moved to B.C. in 1996 to join Genstar in Burnaby as vice-president for the Pacific region.

For Keenan, charity has always been an important part of life, reflecting morals that were instilled in him at a young age.

“Giving back to the community was the centre of discussion at dinner each night,” he says.

His mother, Edna, was involved with the Ontario Cancer Institute, the Heart and Stroke Foundation and the Boys Clubs of Canada; his father, William, handled fundraising for sport activities around Oshawa.

For his part, Keenan has lent a hand to a variety of organizations over the years, including the United Way. Keenan’s father and grandfather handled labour negotiations for General Motors.

Through their experiences he learned an important lesson: in business as in life, patience is a virtue. It’s wisdom that has stood Keenan in good stead as he deals with the wrangling so common in the land development business.

“Positions can get taken on many issues in the initial stages,” he says. “But through dialogue and understanding — articulating the positives and understanding the negatives — these issues can be resolved.”

Keenan has worked for many of the big players in the development industry through the years, helping to establish communities across Canada and the U.S. His efforts haven’t gone unrewarded, as evidenced by the plum position he currently holds at Genstar.

Yet the impressive professional achievements often have come at a personal cost. “Sometimes my family has been sacrificed for a successful outcome,” Keenan says. “When full attention had to be given (to work), unfortunately my family has been put to the sideline at times. My greatest accomplishments have also been the greatest sacrifices.”

So moving out west might have been the best thing this Easterner could have done. Keenan, a self-described “sporting nut,” has made the most of the natural beauty that surrounds him here, hiking, canoeing and kayaking whenever possible.

“In Toronto, you acquire a work ethic that drives you from six in the morning to nine at night, but there’s a lot of consequences with that,” he says. “Here, you’re able to balance that strong ethic with the natural environment. The West Coast is probably more conducive to that balance than Toronto.”